2013 FINA World Championships (Swimming, diving, etc.)

Today is the first day of the FINA World Championships in Barcelona. The first diving final (Women's 3m synchro) is going on right now. Unfortunately, unless you have Universal Sports on TV, you can't watch it without a bootleg Eurosport feed. I thought you could subscribe to Universal Sports online?

Anyway, here is the link to the official website. I will try to post updates after events.

Apparently, the worlds in swimming/diving, track, and gymnastics this year will all be handled by Universal Sports. So if anybody's out there from Universal, let us watch these online! We'll pay! Something's better than nothing.

The diving 3m synchro event for the ladies was exciting to watch for the silver and bronze medals, in the final round Mexico came close to the bronze after Malaysia and Britain failed but the canadians recovered from an early miss and defeat the mexicans by 1.5 points in the final dive and got the medal. But still it was a fight till the end for the bronze and Mexico came strong after a poor preliminary session and put again our team on the map after severall years not really contending for the top spots.

The chinese were impecable with veteran Wu Minxia who 10 years ago also won the event with another diver back then. Italians got the silver rightfully so.

In the men's 1m springboard China also lead the preliminaries, followed by a french and a ukrainian divers. Mexico strong performance with newcomer Kevin Chavez in 4th place despite some costly errors and veteran Rommel Pacheco who finished in sixth place. All go into the final this Monday.

A good start for our diving program after a great Olympics in London, right now its one of our few national sports that is well delivering internationally so the hopes and expectations for the team to do great things and take medals just get a good start.

You can follow delayed coverage on some youtube channels, once the uploader post the videos (some even full coverage)

Surprise with the chinese not taking the gold and almost missing the podium. Germans won because they have what the mexicans still dont, experience. Even though Mexico won the silver medal in London at the event but at worlds it was clear that they just felt the pressure, specially German Sanchez who also lost the podium at the recent universiade when he was leading the individual platform and lost the dive and didnt even medal, two events so close and to have the same mistake on the ´easiest´ dive of their list is something weird. The mexicans also have the most difficult dive list in the world right now and it was sad that they were out of the medals because until that 5th round they were having the best competition of their young career, even the final dive got 95 points, huge mark but the damage was done. Disappointing since they were almost a sure medal for Mexico, but another fourth place. Still very young (19 and 20) so this will give them valuable experience

The germans Klein and Hausding, right winners with a good dives, confident, secure and consistent in all six dives. Sasha Klein now has beat the chinese at world championships individually and in synchro at 10m Platform.

Russians capitalized on the mistakes of chinese and mexicans and got the silver narrowly. Consistency is the name of the game for them, always.

And finally Mexico won a medal in diving, Kevin Chavez in his world championship debut delivered a solid performance and took the bronze just a few points shy of the silver. China won gold and Ukraine took silver.

Though there were two possibilities but Espinosa/Orozco, current olympic silver medalist, failed to perform like they did in the prelims and failed to make the podium in the women's 10m platform synchro and placed a disappointing sixth place. The winners, guess who? China, silver for Canada and bronze for Malaysia

But finally the mexicans won a medal and it could boost the confidence of the rest of the team for the remaining invidual events and the Men's 3m Springboard Synchro event were China, Russia and Mexico are the pre-favourites to make the podium.

Too bad for Tania Cognotto, it is her best individual result at any world championship, but she just can't seem to get any breaks (she missed out on bronze at the Olympics in London by a similar margin).

Another big surprise today with Olympic and European champion Ilia Zakharov failing to make the final in the men's 3m springboard. The U.S. divers are having a rather poor performance overall, which I expected with so many inexperienced divers on the team, but it's still disappointing after the strong showing in London last year.

I've been out of town for a few days, so I'm still catching up. Looking at the men's 3m springboard final for today, it's surprising that Jack Laugher of GBR failed to make the final after winning the preliminary round. Even though everyone's scores went up in the semis, his scores from the prelims would have easily made the finals.

If you search clavadosdiving on YouTube, you can watch the roughly hour long daily highlight shows FINA is producing.

About time Okimoto got some medals! Gold specially! She's been "almost there" for a loong time.
Nice for Ana Marcela Cunha to get a medal (meaning, almost win!) on the 10km swim, she's been focusing on it for Rio, since her main event (25km) is not an olympic one.

Men's 3m Springboard was a weird competition but in the end the chinese prevailed once again and two time defeding world champion showed why he is now a three time consecutive gold medal winner, the guy was an ode to consistency and clean entries to the water, all the recognition to him. But his fellow country, Qin Kai completely missed one dive and though he scored 100 plus points in the fifth round he then missed again in the final and ended up fifth no medal and most likely retirement.

Evgeny Kusnetzov of Russia won the silver with consistent dives, but not all that clean to threat the chinese, but he is still very young and raised the hand for Team Russia after Anton Zakharov, 2012 Olympic champion on this event, failed to qualify to this final. Mexico won another bronze medal, a deserved individual one, with Yahel Castillo who has been around for some time but has never won an individual world/olympic medal. Its a shame that the fifht round dive is a low 3.0 DD one, a very easy dive but that always gets on his mind and takes him out of the medals, he even missed in the final with only 57.00 points but he closed with a 3.9 degree of dificulty, the highest, and a 99 monster score so he bumped the ukrainian guy who was fighting for the bronze with him. Yahel deserved a major championship medal since some time ago and now he has it to get with the world bronze medal he won in 2011 in synchro diving. A good way to open his cycle onto Rio 2016.

Chinese ladies dominating the field in the Prelims and Semis of the 3m springboard. Paola Espinosa (MEX), who is now competing at this event, qualified fourth behind Canada's Jennifer Abel who is poised to take the bronze. Laura Sanchez of Mexico managed to get into 7th place and hopes to repeat the podium she got in London at this worlds.

Overall a great show, maybe the best, in the history of Mexico's diving program. With 2 events to go and still a good shot at a medal, thus far we have had 3 bronze medals, 3 fourth places, 1 sixth place, 1 seventh and one 10th place. Only three of our divers did not advance to the semifinals.

In Synchro Swimming, Team Free Routine, Russia won the gold, Spain silver and Ukraine bronze.

Swimming is coming! Team USA is now at Barcelona and they hold a press conference with Lochte, Franklin, Grevers, Adrian, Coughlin and Voelmer

The Chinese divers were very inconsistent in the 10 M semi - LIN Yue was 4, 2, 18, 18, 3, 18 and ended up not qualifying, and QIU Bo was 18, 15, 4, 1, 12, and 3 in his dives. Which QIU Bo will show up for the final?

Katie Ledecky took gold in the 400m freestyle, she lead the race from the start, just awesome race and went under 4 minutes!!! second swimmer ever to do it, she was excited and surprised about that time. Silver for Spain with Melanie Costa Schmid and bronze for New Zeland. Pre favourite and current olympic champion Camille Muffat of France finished a distant 7th place.

Then the 4x100m freestyle relay. Bronte Campbell was stunning with the leading leg, along with Missy Franklin who open for the USA but was well behind the australians and that was almost the pace throughout the race but in the final, Meagan Romano showed a fierce determination and out touched Alicia Coutts and grab the gold for the americans, Coutts was crying in the end but I think she paid the effort because she already swam the 100m butterfly and 200m Medley Semifinals, and then to go and close the relay? maybe was too much under her and with a fresh american team, it was still close but disappointing for the australian girls. Netherlands took the bronze

Men's 400m free, Sun Yang the favourite and he won the gold, silver for Kosuke Hajino of Japan who is going for SIX individual medals at this world championhips and bronze for USA with Conor Jaeger who celebrated his medal like it was a gold, good for him

And in the men's 4x100 meter freestyle relay, a consistent french team make the best out of them and won the race in the final meters, they never had the lead but in the end Jeremy Stravius (a backstroker) was very fast and touched first. USA had a good race, always going in 1st or 2nd but in the end they narrowly defeated the russians who took the bronze medal that must be a bit disappointing since they were considered the favourites considering the guys they have (Morozov, Grechin and Izotov). Australia in fourth place, not the best way to start for them.

And the final diving event, the chinese guy was PERFECT, dive after dive after dive, one better than the previous. He destroyed the field clearly and the score almost breaking into the 600 points!! I have never seen a demonstration like the one Qiu Bo had in the final!!!

Boudia repeat the podium he had in 2011 worlds and backed up his gold from London with a good second place though he lost a bit of ground in the final two rounds but he was with a confortable margin of points he amased in the first 4 dives, nice for him and for taking a medal for the americans who had a poor show at this worlds overall

Sasha Klein, repeated his form and consistency that experience has given him so he took the bronze medal by some 2 points, leting German Sanchez of Mexico in fourth place (another one for the team) who had control over his nerves this time and did a good competition but some small mistakes cost him the medal, good was not good enough so this is valuable experience for German who had some mental issues on nerves before and never managed to qualify to an olympic/world final on this event and now on his first show and ended just shy of the podium. He has learn how to compete and now he has to learn how to win, like the german diver indeed.

Ivan Garcia of Mexico, in fifth with errors on the first two round that cost him the silver medal. If he didn't missed one dive he would probably have won the silver medal. His last 2 dives were almost 200 points between them, specially the 5th round dive when he scored 104 points for a 4.1 DD dive that right now only the mexican divers do in the world. Congratulations still to him, his coach tweeted some positive messages to German and Ivan (he coaches boath) and encouraged them to keep working now that they have the experience and knowing they belong to the best in the world individually not only as a synchro diving couple.

Great future for both Ivan and German, as a synchro couple and individual, as they are young (at 19 and 21 years) and for Mexico's diving program that had an amazing meet in Barcelona, beyond expectations after a good Olympic Games.

Tom Daley with mistakes and inconsistent competition, he will have to work a lot since the youngsters are coming and already surpassed him.

Tom Daley with mistakes and inconsistent competition, he will have to work a lot since the youngsters are coming and already surpassed him.

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Daley has had injuries for most of the year, most recently a torn triceps. He had to have a local anesthetic to be able to compete and was just glad to be able to make the final with the lack of training he's been able to do this year. http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/diving/23482333

Watching the men's 4x100 relay podium presentation yesterday, and Nathan Adrian appeared to walk off halfway through before coming back by the time they were all standing for photos at the end - anyone know what all that was about?

Daley has had injuries for most of the year, most recently a torn triceps. He had to have a local anesthetic to be able to compete and was just glad to be able to make the final with the lack of training he's been able to do this year. http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/diving/23482333

Watching the men's 4x100 relay podium presentation yesterday, and Nathan Adrian appeared to walk off halfway through before coming back by the time they were all standing for photos at the end - anyone know what all that was about?

I hope you can watch it and they dont take off from my channel in youtube, Universal Sports is already claiming rights

Jessica Hardy and Breeja Larson of the USA, advanced to the final but Ruta is the one to beat and really I think nobody can catch her, ir will be a race of her against the clock. But silver and bronze are up for grabs, will see if Hardy finally wins a medal in the event she had the world record now in the hands of the lithuanian.

In the other semifinals, USA poised to take the usual gold medal in the men and women 100m bacstroke, Missy Franklin looked solid and is going to threat the world record tomorrow.

Matt Grevers and David Plummer are well poised to step in the top of the podium but they will face fierce battle from the french, a greatly motivated Jeremy Stravius who won gold in the 4x100 free relay yesterday and Camille Lacourt who is looking in god form and shape again, remember this duo tied for the world title in 2001 worlds. Watch out for Kosuke Hagino or Riosuke Irie

Hagino of Japan will go for two more medals in the 200m free and 100m backstroke tomorrow, he could get them but it will be a tough night as he has lots of races still to go and some already on the books, but he is 18 years old and motivated to became the japanese version of Phelps/Lochte